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John V. Hansen's blogen-usThu, 22 Feb 2018 02:12:11 -0700Mon, 21 Sep 2015 13:37:00 -0700BlogCFChttp://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rssno-reply@johnvhansen.comno-reply@johnvhansen.comno-reply@johnvhansen.comJohn's blog - www.johnvhansen.comhttp://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm
no‘Fear the Walking Dead,’ ‘Strain’ villains want power for power’s sakehttp://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm/2015/9/21/Fear-the-Walking-Dead-Strain-villains-want-power-for-powers-sake
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A couple seasons ago on "The Walking Dead," Rick and the gang agreed to march toward Washington, D.C., on Eugene's promise that there was a governmental structure in place working against the zombie plague. While the characters never spoke in-depth about the question of whether the government – which demonstrably failed to stop the zombie plague -- should be trusted, I felt strongly that once the gang got to D.C., they would not find a safe government-run utopia.
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The twist came earlier than I expected when it turned out Eugene was making the whole thing up for the sake of having a purpose in life, and the government's actual role in the post-apocalyptic world, if any, has remained a mystery through five seasons. But now the spinoff/prequel <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3743822/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">"Fear the Walking Dead"</a> is shedding some light. In the fourth episode, the military men haul off Griselda, with her damaged foot, and Nick, with his drug addiction, in decidedly violent and underhanded fashion. They break their promise that Griselda's husband, Daniel, can come along for the surgery. And in the case of Nick, he needed medication, not a hospital trip at gunpoint.
So what is the government's nefarious goal?, a viewer is tempted to ask. Did something go wrong with secret medical experiments? Has the United States been taken over by madmen who want to see walkers rule the world? The answer, I think, is simpler: The soldiers and their unseen bosses on "Fear the Walking Dead" are exercising power for power's sake (and many of the lower-ranking soldiers are kept in line due to the allure and continually stressed importance of following orders). Lieutenant Moyers, casually using a recently ruined neighborhood as a golf driving range, says it's not his job to tell frightened wives where their husbands have been hauled off to – that's a job for social workers. As he tells this to Travis, it's clear from the look in Moyers' eyes that he enjoys power, and no explanation is needed beyond that.
I saw a similar look from a young man who visited the Libertarian Party booth I was manning at the Missouri State Fair a few years ago. We gave visitors the World's Smallest Political Quiz, which plots people's political views on a diamond-shaped graph. The goal is to demonstrate that most people lean toward liberty – the top of the diamond -- in their hearts and minds. But there were some exceptions; this young man plotted firmly on the bottom of the diamond, in the totalitarian grid. I was momentarily surprised, but one look in his eyes was explanation enough: This man believed in power and law and order and might makes right -- and that was both the start and the end of the debate.
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When debating the dangers of giving special powers to a special group, the obvious example is the rise of the Nazis, but that's also a bad arguing tactic due to Godwin's Law – invoking the Nazis ends the argument at a stalemate because it's the most extreme example. Still, TV dramas can get away with Nazi stories (indeed, they've long made ideal, controversy-free villains), and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2654620/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">"The Strain"</a> powerfully (no pun intended) tells of Thomas Eichorst's rise from bad salesman to strutting SS man in Sunday's episode. We see Eichorst marching through town in crisp regalia, being saluted by his uneasy former boss; not far away, a family of lynched Jews hangs from tree limbs in broad daylight.
While "The Strain" obviously skipped over some transitional scenes for the sake of a concise backstory, that made the message stronger in a way. As Daniel – sort of a practical Yoda figure -- says on "Fear the Walking Dead," "When it happens, it happens fast." Whether he's referring to a full-on police state or an apocalypse, it holds true either way.
Using Nazis as villains is nothing new, but at no point did the writers hedge their bets by showing how extreme Nazis are compared to other political movements: Eichorst's story is simply about a man who desires power and finds it through government. But "Fear the Walking Dead" is more remarkable, because it is portraying U.S. police officers and American soldiers as villains (hapless in the former case, power-hungry in the latter case) – and just as invoking Nazis usually stalemates an argument, so does criticizing police or the U.S. military. Yet "Fear the Walking Dead" just went there.
Perhaps even more powerfully than the cold hard facts about the militarization of police in recent years (see Eric Garner, Kelly Thomas, Walter Scott, Baby Bou Bou, highway patrol checkpoints, etc.) is the fact that Hollywood is now addressing this national problem through its fiction – and that it happens to be end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it fiction is not something to be brushed off, either. Hollywood is one of the most casually and consistently statist enclaves in America, and while it's true that stories with all political viewpoints come out of Tinseltown (that's just good business sense), the bluntness of these anti-institution stories on two fairly mainstream shows is remarkable.
It should also be noted that humans value life in 2015 more than at any time in history – that's why, even though we've allowed the police state to emerge, people of all political beliefs are also concerned by that fact. Nazis could hang Jews in the open without an immediate citizens' revolt in the 1930s, but such a brazen display would not happen today, at least not in the Western world. But the allure of power (see Donald Trump, who has money and fame and now seeks to complete the trifecta) and the desire to be ruled (see passionate supporters of Trump and other mainstream candidates) are also common human traits, as they always have been.
On "Fear the Walking Dead" and "The Strain," the writers have not invoked conspiracies or medical experiments gone awry, as much as we might suspect those explanations are lurking around the corner. The villains want power because they want power. That's a powerful message, especially coming from Hollywood.
Strain, TheTelevisionWalking Dead, TheMon, 21 Sep 2015 13:37:00 -0700http://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm/2015/9/21/Fear-the-Walking-Dead-Strain-villains-want-power-for-powers-sake2015: The summer of horror TVhttp://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm/2015/8/22/2015-The-summer-of-horror-TV
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Entertainment trends are a funny thing. Horror movie releases have slowed to a trickle, whereas a decade ago there was a new one in theaters every week. But horror TV shows were rare then, whereas today, the boob tube is covered with them. Even though horror is still scarier on the big screen for obvious reasons, TV is making a strong case as a home for horror in 2015 -- some of the best horror TV ever made, actually.
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"Hannibal," "The Strain" and "Scream" are in the midst of their summer runs; "Fear the Walking Dead" starts on Sunday and "Scream Queens" debuts next month. "Bates Motel," "iZombie" and the original "Walking Dead" will return at some point, and "American Horror Story" – which I abandoned awhile back – keeps cranking out new chapters. This summer's "Wayward Pines" had a significant fright factor with its Abbies, too.
But let's go back to those three summer shows I started with. They make a case that horror fans are enjoying quality as well as quantity.
<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2243973/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">"Hannibal"</a> (10 p.m. Eastern Saturdays on NBC), which is 11 episodes into its 13-episode third season, is unquestionably the most gruesome show ever to air on network television. It enjoys a rare benefit granted to shows that are very successful or very unsuccessful in the ratings: The network is leaving producer Bryan Fuller and his team alone. (In fact, the only time an episode was pulled – a Season 1 hour about kids killing their families -- it was Fuller who pulled it.)
Unfortunately, "Hannibal" is unsuccessful in the ratings, which is why this is the final season. But it will be talked about and picked apart by TV geeks, critics and teachers of cinematography and style for years into the future. The Onion's AV Club already salivates over it.
While I get immersed in the moody visuals and Mads Mikkelsen's mesmerizing performance as much as anyone, I feel disconnected from Season 3. Fuller and his writers have gotten more experimental than ever, playing with nonsequential storytelling. It seems like Abigail Hobbs – one of several characters under Hannibal's sway – has been killed off at least twice, but she's still a prominent figure on the show.
Also, I suspect the writers truncated the plot about Mason Verger planning to cut up and eat the title character when they found out "Hannibal" was being canceled. The narrative jumped ahead three years in order to chronicle the Red Dragon saga, where Hannibal assists that killer via telephone despite being locked up and watched by Alana. Fans of Fuller's rich adaptations of Thomas Harris' novels can take heart that even if "Hannibal" had been renewed for a fourth season, they wouldn't have been able to tackle "Silence of the Lambs" and Clarice Starling next, as they couldn't secure the rights.
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I'm a bigger fan of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2654620/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">"The Strain"</a> (10 p.m. Eastern Sundays on FX), which is six episodes into its 13-episode second season. It has a lot of similarities to "Hannibal": It's based on a book series (by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan) and it is known for its cinematography and gross-out visuals. The ancient vampires transfer their essences into new hosts by vomiting crawly critters into the other's mouth, making a case that "The Strain" is the most disgusting show ever to air on TV.
The reason I like it, though, is the characters. It's unlikely Ephraim, Nora, Abraham, Fet and Dutch would come together in any situation other than a vampire apocalypse. I've even forgotten the pre-apocalypse jobs of most of them, although Fet (Kevin Durand) is memorably a rat catcher and Abraham (David Bradley) – rather ancient himself -- has spent most of his life aiming to take down these vampires. Even if the epic battle of humans versus vamps wasn't itself compelling – with Eph recently moving into the horrifying arena of medicinal patent politics -- "The Strain" would be worth watching just to see Durand and Bradley competitively chew scenery.
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<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3921180/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">"Scream: The TV Series"</a> (10 p.m. Eastern Tuesdays on MTV), which is eight episodes into its 10-episode first season, is obviously not on par with "Hannibal" or "The Strain." The AV Club, which stopped reviewing it after five episodes, loathes "Scream" as much as it loves "Hannibal." But if I have an episode of both "Scream" and "Hannibal" on my DVR, I'll play "Scream" first; it's shallower, but more immediately entertaining.
"Scream" is not good, per se, but it's fun. I don't give a rip about any of the characters, and it totally falls apart if you look at it closely. The writers sort of acknowledged this a few episodes ago when the new student in town describes Lakewood as being OK, except for all the murders.
The classroom atmosphere on "Scream" reminds me a bit of my college math class on Sept. 11, 2001. It wasn't possible to concentrate on math that day. It's utterly insane that these students should be expected to focus on "The Crucible" the day after a classmates' murder. And it's not just an isolated homicide of someone by someone they know (which is the case with most murders), but rather the latest in a string of killings where any Lakewood student could be the next victim. (In defense of the Lakewood High administration, it would never finish the school year if it canceled school after every death.)
It's also crazy that Noah continues to spout pop-culture references after the demise of several of his friends – including girlfriend Riley, which he seemed bothered by for about five minutes. He even makes a crack about how he wouldn't mind if his teachers were possessed by aliens a la "The Faculty" if one of them was Famke Janssen. He doesn't say it nervously; he's aloof enough to be a suspect (even though he's been pursued by the killer – but as the 1996 film showed, there are ways to explain that). That having been said, I dig the fact that there's a TV show making references to "The Faculty."
"Scream" turned a corner with the bowling-alley episode a couple weeks back. The show can't wring any more mileage out of victims being chased by a maniac who wildly swings his knife as he gets pinned by a partly closed door. However, when it finds a good set such as the abandoned bowling alley, it can create some atmosphere.
Although the cast has been whittled down, I don't know who the killer is. The last hour outright told us the murderer is the long-lost half-brother of Emma, but I figure there will be more twists coming. The biggest mystery of all might be how "Scream" is going to have a second season (it has already been renewed). Perhaps a whole new setting and cast are in the works.
What are your thoughts on this summer of horror TV? And what horror shows are you looking forward to in the coming months?
Strain, TheHannibalTelevisionScreamSat, 22 Aug 2015 01:11:00 -0700http://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm/2015/8/22/2015-The-summer-of-horror-TV‘The Strain’ is breaking out to become great, lights-out horror TVhttp://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm/2014/8/12/The-Strain-is-breaking-out-to-become-great-lightsout-horror-TV
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Through five episodes, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2654620/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1" target="_blank">"The Strain"</a> (8 p.m. Central Sundays on FX) is already shaping up to be one of the best horror TV shows ever. Its combination of wonderful Guillermo del Toro-style mood along with believable modern special effects would make for a fine horror flick, but the fact that it's a 13-episode miniseries allows for more depth.
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Taking advantage of the medium, each hour has gradually shown the advancement of this vampire plague -- it seems like it'll go global soon -- while also allowing for moral nuance. "The Strain" is based on a book and comic book series, which – like TV -- have similar advantages over movies. When it comes to the topic of horror done right on TV, "The Walking Dead" springs to mind, but I have heard that a fair number of viewers find that show boring. While I'm not in that group, I suspect that part of their boredom comes from the deliberate pacing and the way the rules of the zombie plague are conveniently parceled out. (Classics like "The X-Files" and "Buffy" are great horror TV, but I categorize those as dramas that have horror elements. "The X-Files" was a mood piece and "Buffy" was a character piece. Similarly, I'd say "Bates Motel" is a character drama and "Hannibal" is a style piece. Only rarely did/do those four shows aim to scare viewers as consistently as "The Walking Dead" or "The Strain" do.)
"The Strain" embraces the chaos of how a real plague would unfold. As we learned in the pilot episode, four survivors are infected on the plane at the same time. However, the goth singer turns into a vampire a couple episodes into the series, and Jack Bauer's wife is finally succumbing to the disease only now. These "Strain" vampires can live above ground in the early stages of their transformation, but – as we see when the pest-control worker (scene-stealing character actor Kevin Durand) ventures into the sewers – the completely transformed vampires can't handle the sunlight. The traits of the condition have been unveiled like the notes of a symphony, from the goth singer's no-longer-needed genitalia falling into the toilet, where he calmly flushes them, to the suburban mom feeling like there's something in her eye before they blink sideways for the first time.
Best of all is the scene where our CDC heroes (Corey Stoll's Ephram, Mia Maestro's Nora and Sean Astin's Jim) dissect a vampire and Stoll pulls a 15-foot long stinger from its mouth. This stinger mechanism makes the "Strain" vampires a cross between traditional human-esque vamps and the xenomorphs from "Alien," and it has led to some great scenes, such as the nursing home attack that finds Nora deadpanning to her mom: "We're going home." Furthermore, "The Strain" can play the dark humor card almost as well as "Fargo," another 2014 FX show. Most notable is the scene where the flustered housewife is confronted by her neighbor about her barking dog. She tricks him into entering the shed to teach the "dog" some manners, knowing that her infected/transforming husband has chained himself in there for her protection.
The special effects are so good at making the vampires look far gone from their humanity that it seems absurd that Nora would morally oppose Eph's and vampire hunter Abraham's (David Bradley) plan to kill everyone who is infected (and destroy the corpses of those who may have been infected before they died). On the other hand, the most recent episode finds Abraham – always armed with that awesome cane-sword – beheading the barking-dog complainant. He was PROBABLY infected, but the moral ambiguity was palpable.
A TV series also allows for more mythological depth, and "The Strain" rather abruptly dug into that rich minefield on Sunday by showing that floaty, wispy bloodsucker picking off Nazi concentration camp prisoners one by one at night. Those scenes took me out of the flow of the series a bit, as I suddenly had to reconcile the scary fun of a ridiculous vampire drama against the real-life horror of the Nazi atrocities. However, I'll give this flashback plotline a chance because I like the visual parallel to "Harry Potter's" Dementors. I wonder if this floaty vampire is not merely sucking blood but purposely picking off the downtrodden. And of course I hope those Nazis eventually become its victims, although it's possible the Nazis will get transformed into the ringleaders of the 2014 plague.
Even in the midst of a golden age for horror TV, "The Strain" is making its mark. It has scares to match the best horror flicks plus a rarely equaled richness to the way the outbreak and mythology unfolds. I'm enjoying a little piece of this grand story every Sunday, always with the lights out.
Strain, TheTelevisionTue, 12 Aug 2014 00:32:00 -0700http://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm/2014/8/12/The-Strain-is-breaking-out-to-become-great-lightsout-horror-TVFirst episode impressions: ‘The Strain’http://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm/2014/7/16/First-episode-impressions-The-Strain
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On the heels of "Fargo," FX continues its miniseries winning streak with <a href="http://www.fxnetworks.com/thestrain" target="_blank">"The Strain"</a> (9 p.m. Central Sundays on FX), based on a novel and Dark Horse comic book series. Like "Fargo" and the more open-ended "The Bridge" (now in its second season), "The Strain" is deliciously and darkly stylish, as one would expect from co-producer Guillermo del Toro, who is also credited as a writer and director on some upcoming episodes.
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In Sunday's nicely paced but predictable pilot episode, "The Strain" got by almost entirely on mood. I recommend watching the series in a dark room. The initial hook is almost identical to the pilot episode of "Fringe": A plane lands safely, but everyone aboard is dead. The next twist – which will surprise no one who is slightly familiar with vampire or zombie fiction -- is that a few passengers are alive, but they aren't themselves. One of the creepiest scenes is saved for last, when one of the airplane victims, a young girl, suddenly returns home while her distraught father weeps. Adding to the intrigue (and gross-out factor): An old man (David Bradley) with a cane-sword keeps an embryonic form of one of the strain-creatures as a pet and feeds it drops of his own blood.
"The Strain" overplays its horror hand a bit. While the scientific details of how the strain works haven't been ironed out yet (along with whether the villains are monsters or aliens), there's not much of a mystery to unravel. The virus victims are obviously possessed, as their pastiness and sideways-blinking eyes demonstrate. It's not like they are just a little bit off -- they are basically zombies, except that their goal is not to eat people but presumably to spread the illness to new victims. The main villain creature -- who emerges from a dirt-filled, gargoyle-etched coffin in a trope reminiscent of "Dracula" and "The Relic" and many other horror classics – is a fleet-afoot CGI man/bat/witch like we might have seen in the later seasons of "The X-Files." I'm not complaining all that much, as I like goofy horror almost as much as the scary kind.
So far, the characters are typically bland horror-story types. The lead investigator (Corey Stoll, the "Law & Order: LA" detective who wasn't Skeet Ulrich) finds his marriage is falling apart because he spends so much time on his job, and he has a "quirky TV investigator" affectation: He drinks pint-sized cartons of milk. Others on the investigative team, including Sean Astin's character, are pawns in whatever the strain-zombies' game is.
I'm not sure if "The Strain" intends to stick with a main cadre of protagonists, or if it's going to kill everyone off at a rate so brisk that "The Walking Dead's" writing team cringes. There are a lot of actors credited on IMDB's "The Strain" page with only one or two episodes. Maybe that's OK, because after one episode, it's the villains, the virus and especially the wonderfully moody style of the show that have my attention more so than the stock humans who are investigating the case.
Strain, TheTelevisionWed, 16 Jul 2014 23:42:00 -0700http://www.johnvhansen.com/jvh/blog/index.cfm/2014/7/16/First-episode-impressions-The-Strain